 |
||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Serving you since 1998 | ||||||||||||
|
|
Kabul says US relations unaffected by Karzai claims
by Sardar Ahmad
KABUL (AFP) – Afghanistan said Monday its relations with the United States would not be affected by leaked cables portraying President Hamid Karzai as weak and paranoid, and his brother as a corrupt drugs baron.
Karzai's brother 'corrupt drugs baron' US says: WikiLeaks
by Claire Truscott – Mon Nov 29, 2:47 am ET
KABUL (AFP) – Leaked US documents on Monday painted President Hamid Karzai's controversial younger brother as a corrupt drugs baron, exposing deep US concerns about graft undermining the war against the Afghan Taliban.
WikiLeak: Afghan president's brother loves Lakeview
November 29, 2010 8:14 AM Chicago Tribune
As the WikiLeaks organization continues to release hundreds of thousands of confidential documents and alleged national security secrets, the most recent batch Sunday provides some fodder for Chicagoans.
Analysis: WikiLeaks shows 21st-century secrets harder to keep
Reuters By Peter Apps, Political Risk Correspondent Sun Nov 28, 2010
LONDON - The diplomatic cables so far released by WikiLeaks might embarrass U.S. diplomats but probably won't shatter any international relationships.
NATO says six troops shot dead in east Afghanistan
By Paul Tait
KABUL (Reuters) – Six NATO troops were shot dead by a man wearing an Afghan border police uniform during a training exercise in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, the coalition said, the worst apparent "rogue" shooting in more than a year.
AFGHANISTAN: How much development aid will leave with the troops?
KABUL, 29 November 2010 (IRIN) - The planned withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan over the next four years will also reduce development aid, particularly for so-called “hearts and minds” projects aimed at social upliftment, experts say.
U.S. pledges 36 mln dollars for Afghan agriculture sector
KABUL, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- In efforts to enhance and modernize agriculture sector in Afghanistan, the United States has pledged 36 million U.S. dollars to boost agriculture sector in the war- torn country, U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan Karl W. Eikenberry said Sunday.
Afghan Radio Wars: Combating the Taliban's Message Machine
By Jason Motlagh / Forward Operating Base Andar Sunday, Nov. 28, 2010 time.com
At dusk last Friday, four Taliban mortars crashed to the ground near the district center in Miri, a small town in eastern Ghazni province where a U.S. Army company is based. Shrapnel from one of the blasts injured two children in a residential area, a 12-year-old girl and one-year-old boy, who later died of his injuries. It was the second time in as many months that militants had killed local civilians, and U.S. forces were not going to let it be forgotten.
Cleanup operation kills 7 Taliban militants, wounds 3 in N Afghanistan
PUL-E-KHUMRI, Afghanistan, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- A cleanup operation launched against Taliban militants in Baghlan-e-Markazi district of northern Baghlan province have left seven insurgents dead and three others injured, police spokesman in the province Ahmad Jawed Basharat said Sunday.
Good Cop, Bad Cop: Afghanistan's National Police
Police Is Critical Part in Fighting Insurgency, But Many Problems Remain
CBS.com Nov. 28, 2010
President Obama wants to begin withdrawing American forces from Afghanistan next summer, but his ability to do that will largely depend on how quickly Afghan security forces can be trained to take over the fight.
Afghan Officials Should Register Assets: World Bank
TOLOnews.com Sunday, 28 November 2010 20:00
World Bank and other donors have warned to suspend their aid if all Afghan government officials do not register their assets
Calls From Man With Terror Links Prompted German Alert, Official Says
New York Times By MICHAEL SLACKMAN November 28, 2010
BERLIN - Germany’s recent decision to declare a terrorism alert and dispatch heavily armed police around the nation was set off by phone calls from a man who said he wanted to quit working with terrorists and warned of a pending Mumbai-style attack, according to a law enforcement official with firsthand knowledge of the alert.
Back to Top
Kabul says US relations unaffected by Karzai claims
by Sardar Ahmad
KABUL (AFP) – Afghanistan said Monday its relations with the United States would not be affected by leaked cables portraying President Hamid Karzai as weak and paranoid, and his brother as a corrupt drugs baron.
The American diplomatic cables raised the issue of suspected high-level corruption within the Afghan government, long a concern among Western backers who see it as undermining the nine-year war against the Taliban.
Internet whistleblower WikiLeaks has begun releasing a quarter of a million confidential US diplomatic cables, detailing embarrassing and inflammatory episodes in what the White House called a "reckless and dangerous action".
But Karzai's spokesman Waheed Omer told a news conference the leaks "won't have any impact on the strategic relations between the US and Afghanistan".
"We don't see anything substantive in the document that will strain the relationship," Omer told reporters, adding: "We'll wait and see what else comes out before making further comment."
On leaked US criticism of Karzai as an "extremely weak" leader, which follows negative US media reports, Omer said: "Such comments are not new. But the president... will carry on with what he thinks is good for Afghanistan."
US diplomats described Karzai in the documents as "driven by paranoia" and "conspiracy theories".
The leaked cables also reveal American feelings about the president's younger brother Ahmed Wali Karzai, long dogged by claims of unsavoury links with the lucrative opium trade and private security firms, which he denies.
Western officials have kept quiet in public on the tainted record of the president's half brother, who is a powerful figure in Kandahar, where US forces are leading the fight to break the Taliban.
But one note, that followed a meeting between the younger Karzai and US envoy Frank Ruggiero in September 2009, revealed:
"While we must deal with AWK (Ahmed Wali Karzai) as the head of the provincial council, he is widely understood to be corrupt and a narcotics trafficker."
Kandahar is a make-or-break battleground in the US-led fight to defeat the insurgency, and the United States has poured thousands of extra troops into the area to wrest initiative from the Taliban and bolster the Afghan government.
"The meeting with AWK highlights one of our major challenges in Afghanistan: how to fight corruption and connect the people to their government, when the key government officials are themselves corrupt," the report said.
In the 2009 meeting with American and Canadian officials, the president's brother urged the allies not to fund small-scale cash projects -- a cornerstone of its counter-insurgency strategy -- but to build large mega-projects instead.
"Given AWK's reputation for shady dealings, his recommendations for large, costly infrastructure projects should be viewed with a healthy dose of scepticism," the report said.
"We will continue to urge AWK to improve his own credibility gap," said the report, adding that both Ahmed Wali Karzai and Kandahar governor Tooryalai Wesa had tried to influence the awarding of contracts in the province.
Ahmed Wali Karzai also showed disdain for elections in the region, the report said, claiming that local elders were better placed to provide governance.
In a second meeting in February, Ahmed Wali Karzai told Ruggiero that he was willing to take a polygraph test to prove his innocence over claims of his involvement in the opium trade.
"He appears not to understand the level of our knowledge of his activities, and that the coalition views many of his activities as malign, particularly relating to his influence over the police," said the cable.
"We will need to monitor his activity closely."
Another cable from the US embassy in Kabul said former vice president Ahmed Zia Massoud carried 52 million dollars in cash to Dubai last year.
The cable referred to the cash as "a significant amount" that Massoud "was ultimately allowed to keep without revealing the money?s origin or destination," it said.
Back to Top
Back to Top
Karzai's brother 'corrupt drugs baron' US says: WikiLeaks
by Claire Truscott – Mon Nov 29, 2:47 am ET
KABUL (AFP) – Leaked US documents on Monday painted President Hamid Karzai's controversial younger brother as a corrupt drugs baron, exposing deep US concerns about graft undermining the war against the Afghan Taliban.
Internet whistleblower WikiLeaks has started to release quarter of a million confidential US diplomatic cables, detailing embarrassing and inflammatory episodes in what the White House has condemned as a "reckless and dangerous action".
Ahmed Wali Karzai has long been dogged by allegations of unsavoury links to Afghanistan's lucrative opium trade and private security firms.
But as a powerful figure in Kandahar, where US forces are leading the fight to break a nine-year Taliban insurgency, Western officials have kept quiet in public on the president's younger half brother's tainted record.
Leaked cables from the US embassy in Kabul now reveal their true feelings in moves that could complicate already strained relations between Washington and Karzai at a key juncture in the war.
"While we must deal with AWK (Ahmed Wali Karzai) as the head of the provincial council, he is widely understood to be corrupt and a narcotics trafficker," said one note that followed a meeting between the president's brother and US envoy Frank Ruggiero in September 2009.
Of the meeting itself, the report said Karzai "dressed in a crisp white shalwar kameez and pinstriped vest, appeared nervous, though eager to express his views on the international presence in Kandahar."
Kandahar is a make-or-break battleground in the US-led fight to defeat the insurgency, where the United States has poured in thousands of extra troops to wrest the initiative from the Taliban and bolster the Afghan government.
In May, British Major General Nick Carter, then NATO commander in southern Afghanistan, had said that he hoped Karzai -- chairman of the legislative council -- would cede power to the governor of the province, Tooryalai Wesa.
Afghanistan is ranked one of the most corrupt countries in the world, where official graft undermines public support for the Western-backed government and is believed to help fuel support for the Taliban insurgency.
"The meeting with AWK highlights one of our major challenges in Afghanistan: how to fight corruption and connect the people to their government, when the key government officials are themselves corrupt," the report acknowledged.
In the 2009 meeting with American and Canadian officials, the president's brother urged the allies not to fund small-scale cash projects -- a cornerstone of its counter-insurgency strategy -- but to build large mega-projects instead.
"Given AWK's reputation for shady dealings, his recommendations for large, costly infrastructure projects should be viewed with a healthy dose of scepticism," the report said.
"We will continue to urge AWK to improve his own credibility gap," said the report.
Karzai, who also runs his own private militia in the province, is reported to have said the plethora of independent security firms run by different men in the region should be brought under the control of one man.
The cable noted: "AWK is understood to have a stake in private security contracting, and has aggressively lobbied the Canadians to have his security services retained."
The report said that both Karzai and Wesa had tried to influence the awarding of contracts in the province.
Karzai also showed disdain for democratic elections in the region, the report said, insisting that local elders were better placed to provide governance for the area.
In a second meeting in February, Karzai told Ruggiero that he was willing to take a polygraph test to prove his innocence over claims of his involvement in the opium trade.
"He appears not to understand the level of our knowledge of his activities, and that the coalition views many of his activities as malign, particularly relating to his influence over the police," said the cable.
"We will need to monitor his activity closely...."
President Karzai has another brother, Mahmood Karzai, a former restaurant owner in the United States who is being investigated for tax evasion, according to a report in The Washington Post last month.
The Afghan government gave no immediate comment over the leaked documents.
Back to Top
Back to Top
WikiLeak: Afghan president's brother loves Lakeview
November 29, 2010 8:14 AM Chicago Tribune
As the WikiLeaks organization continues to release hundreds of thousands of confidential documents and alleged national security secrets, the most recent batch Sunday provides some fodder for Chicagoans.
Apparently Ahmed Wali Karzai, the powerful half brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, really loves the city's Lakeview neighborhood.
During meetings with American officials in September 2009 and February 2010, a "nervous, though eager" Ahmed Wali Karzai, dressed in a traditional loose tunic and trousers, tried to win them over with tales about his years running a Chicago restaurant near Wrigley Field, according to The New York Times, which has published documents obtained by WikiLeaks.
The Karzais owned the Helmand restaurant at 3201 N. Halsted St., and Ahmed Wali ran it. The restaurant, which has since closed, served what Tribune critic Phil Vettel in 1995 called "slightly exotic" Afghan cuisine. Ahmed Wali Karzai has been linked to Afghanistan's drug trade, which he has vehemently denied.
On Sunday, the Times detailed secrets revealed from hundreds of thousands of cables obtained by WikiLeaks. The cables are a sampling of the daily traffic between the State Department and some 270 embassies and consulates, according to the newspaper.
Somewhere buried in the conversations was Karzai's love of a hip slice of Chicago.
-- Kristen Schorsch
Back to Top
Back to Top
Analysis: WikiLeaks shows 21st-century secrets harder to keep
Reuters By Peter Apps, Political Risk Correspondent Sun Nov 28, 2010
LONDON - The diplomatic cables so far released by WikiLeaks might embarrass U.S. diplomats but probably won't shatter any international relationships.
The key lesson so far seems to be just how much easier the information age has made it to steal vast quantities of data -- and how much harder it is to keep secrets.
The U.S. and other governments have been keen to talk up the potential diplomatic damage from the release of some 250,000 cables, details of which began to be published on Sunday by Western newspapers.
The cables, some of which were released in full and some only in part, revealed confidential -- and often unflattering -- views and information from senior U.S. diplomats based overseas that would normally have been kept confidential for decades.
Experts and former officials are divided over the impact. Speaking before the release, Italy's foreign minister Franco Frattini said he feared it would prove the "9/11 of diplomacy" and would "blow up the trust between states."
Others are much more sanguine, and believe diplomats will continue their long tradition of politeness in public and brutal honesty in the reports back home.
"This won't restrain dips' (diplomats) candor," Sir Christopher Meyer, a former British Ambassador to Washington DC, told Reuters. "But people will be looking at the security of electronic communications and archives. Paper would have been impossible to steal in these quantities."
That's a lesson governments have been learning fast. British officials have been embarrassed several times by the loss of discs containing personal data for thousands of members of the general public, while experts say hackers have stolen truckloads of sensitive information from Western corporates.
In the case of the latest release -- as with years' worth of U.S. military logs on the Iraq and Afghanistan conflict earlier this year -- the cables appear to have been stolen by just one person. U.S. Army private Bradley Manning has been charged with leaking classified information and is in military custody.
JEOPARDISING DIPLOMACY?
"Whoever was behind this leak should be shot and I would volunteer to pull the trigger," said former U.S. cyber Security and counterterrorism official Roger Cressey, describing it as "pretty devastating."
"The essence of our foreign policy is our ability to talk straight and honest with our foreign counterparts and to keep those conversations out of the public domain. This massive leak puts that most basic of diplomatic requirements at risk in the future."
Cressey points to sensitive relations with Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan, both key to U.S. strategy against Islamic militancy. The cables include criticism of both countries and details of conversations with their senior officials.
Some western leaders reportedly come in for criticism, including British Prime Minister David Cameron. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is described as risk-averse and "rarely creative."
"It is a sign that in the information age, it is very difficult to keep anything secret," said Professor Michael Cox, associate fellow at London think tank Chatham House.
"But as to whether it is going to cause the kind of seismic collapse of international relations that governments have been talking about, I somehow doubt. Diplomats have always said rude things about each other in private, and everyone has always known that."
Some of those who should be most aware of security had been tripped up by the new information age. Last year, security experts were left aghast after the new head of Britain's secret intelligence service MI6's wife posted family photos and details on Facebook. Other officials have been forced to apologize after tongue-in-cheek e-mails have ended up in the public domain.
The real beneficiaries from the vast leak, Cox said, were historians, academics and students of international relations who now had a "great treasure trove" of primary evidence to go through. The volume of data is so vast that details may continue to be extracted from it for years to come.
JUST WHAT NATIONS DO?
But much remains secret. There are cables, for example, asking U.S. diplomats to forward sensitive information on a variety of national leaders and senior politicians. But that information was sent through more secure channels reserved for sensitive intelligence, and remains largely unpublished.
"Governments have a tendency to keep as much information as possible secret or classified, whether it really needs to be or not," said Chatham House fellow Cox.
"The really secret information, I would suggest, is still pretty safe and probably won't end up on WikiLeaks."
What was more worrying, he said, was the apparent ferocity of government campaigns against the whistleblowing website. WikiLeaks complained it was the victim of a cyber attack shortly before the data was released on Sunday, and says sexual assault accusations in Sweden against its founder Julian Assange are also orchestrated by its enemies.
For now, experts say the diplomats in Washington and elsewhere will hurry to reassure allies and soothe ruffled egos. Some may find they are less trusted -- particularly now other nations have seen the cables encouraging diplomats to effectively also function as spies.
Former U.S. counterterrorism official Fred Burton, now vice president for risk consultancy Stratfor, said some long-term intelligence-sharing agreements might be jeopardized and the State Department would now be focused on "serious damage control."
"But this is what nations do," he said. "Rule number one in this business. There are no friendly intelligence services."
(Additional reporting by William Maclean; editing by Andrew Roche)
Back to Top
Back to Top
NATO says six troops shot dead in east Afghanistan
By Paul Tait
KABUL (Reuters) – Six NATO troops were shot dead by a man wearing an Afghan border police uniform during a training exercise in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, the coalition said, the worst apparent "rogue" shooting in more than a year.
The incident appeared to be the latest in a string of recent attacks by renegade police and soldiers, underlining the pressure on NATO-led troops as they try to train Afghan forces rapidly to allow the handover of security responsibility from next year.
However, NATO and Afghan officials were unable to confirm whether the person who carried out the shooting was actually a member of the border police or if it was an insurgent who had infiltrated the Afghan security forces.
Afghan authorities said last year they were tightening vetting procedures for the police and army after a similar incident when a renegade soldier killed five British troops on November 3, 2009.
Aminullah Amarkhil, the head of border police in eastern Afghanistan, said the shooting was in Nangarhar province, which borders Pakistan. Most of the NATO troops based in Nangarhar are American.
"An individual in an Afghan Border Police uniform turned his weapon against International Security Assistance Forces during a training mission today, killing six service members in eastern Afghanistan," the NATO-led ISAF said in a statement.
The statement said the person who shot the troops was also killed. ISAF said the shooting was being investigated but it gave no other details, including the nationality of those killed.
It was the worst daily casualty toll suffered by ISAF since eight troops were killed in five separate incidents on October 14.
Earlier this month, U.S. and NATO leaders agreed to a timeline set by Afghan President Hamid Karzai for foreign forces to end combat operations in Afghanistan by 2014.
U.S. President Barack Obama, who will review his Afghanistan war strategy next month, has said Washington will begin a gradual drawdown of its forces from July 2011.
TENSIONS RISE
Obama and NATO leaders have come under increasing domestic pressure over the unpopular war, with military and civilian casualties at their worst levels since the Taliban were ousted in 2001 despite the presence of about 150,000 foreign troops.
At least 2,238 foreign troops have been killed in Afghanistan since the Taliban government was toppled by U.S.-backed Afghan forces in November 2001, more than 660 of them so far in 2010, by far the bloodiest year of the war.
About 1,400 of the deaths were Americans.
At least 56 ISAF troops were killed in November, according to a count by Reuters and monitoring site iCasualties.org. The push to ramp up Afghan forces has created tensions on the ground. Three ISAF troops were shot by an Afghan soldier in the south earlier this month.
Two Spanish police and an interpreter were killed in August when an Afghan policeman they were training turned on them before he was shot dead.
In July, an Afghan soldier killed three British Gurkha soldiers. A week later, an Afghan soldier killed two U.S. contractors inside a base in Mazar-i-Sharif in the north.
The rapid creation of a national army and police force since the Taliban were ousted has seen tens of thousands of Afghans join up, raising concerns that former insurgents, or sympathizers, may be among them.
(Additional reporting by Hamid Shalizi and Emma Graham-Harrison; Editing by Daniel Magnowski)
Back to Top
Back to Top
AFGHANISTAN: How much development aid will leave with the troops?
KABUL, 29 November 2010 (IRIN) - The planned withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan over the next four years will also reduce development aid, particularly for so-called “hearts and minds” projects aimed at social upliftment, experts say.
“Because development assistance is attached to stability objectives there is a fear that as the international military leaves, the world will forget Afghanistan once again,” Ashley Jackson, head of advocacy and communication at Oxfam International in the capital, Kabul, told IRIN.
During the next four years, forces from 48 countries led by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) will gradually leave Afghanistan and transfer combat responsibilities to the fledging Afghan security forces, in terms of a Transition Process approved by NATO and the Afghan government.
When Canada’s combat mission ends in 2011, its development assistance from 2011 to 2014 will reportedly plummet by 50 percent.
Similar cuts are expected by other donors, who have poured hundreds of millions of dollars in aid into Afghanistan during the past few years, primarily to win military and strategic victories against Taliban insurgents.
All contracts issued by the US government must adhere to “overall Afghanistan Counter Insurgency (COIN) goals”, and where US dollars go “is as important - possibly more important - than the product or service delivered”, the US embassy in Kabul said in a statement on 23 November.
Aid agencies have criticized this approach, describing it as the “militarization of aid”.
Consequences
Despite the impending military withdrawal, many donors, including the US and Canada, have pledged long-term assistance to Afghanistan.
“NATO re-affirms its long-term commitment to a sovereign, independent, democratic, secure and stable Afghanistan that will never again be a safe haven for terrorists and terrorism, and to a better future for the Afghan people,” said a declaration signed by President Hamid Karzai and NATO’s Secretary-General on 20 November.
Many Afghans are somewhat sceptical. “We know from our experience that the international community will have little interest in poverty alleviation, human rights and development after their military forces withdraw,” said Shukria Barakzai, Member of Parliament.
Before 2001, when the world economy was booming, Afghanistan - severely affected by over three decades of war and ranked the least developed country in Asia - received hardly any meaningful foreign development support.
In the past nine years the country has topped the list of many donor countries but has scarcely improved its position among the world’s least developed nations.
A drastic reduction in foreign aid would not only jeopardize Afghanistan’s modest progress during that time, but could also cause disruptions and setbacks in various critical areas. “The consequences could be disastrous,” said Oxfam’s Jackson.
As NATO forces begin transferring responsibility to Afghans in 2011, the global economic situation presents another challenge to post-NATO Afghanistan: attracting aid and investment.
Aid or business?
More than US$40 billion has been disbursed on development projects by UN agencies, NGOs, international military actors and Afghan government bodies since 2002, according to humanitarian organizations, but aid efforts have been widely criticized as ineffective and mismanaged, and experts say accountability has been scant.
Aid workers have also criticized the use of private local and international companies by some donors, including the US, to implement counterinsurgency projects.
“Private development companies are not here for the Afghan people, they are here either to fill their pockets or spend money from their government, so that at home people [will] say they have spent money on development,” Pierre Fallavier, director of the Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU), an independent body, told IRIN.
“Many businesses have boomed and foreigners and a few Afghans have got rich in Afghanistan, but the overwhelming majority of Afghans have remained destitute,” said Shukria Barakzai, the MP.
The unprecedented influx of aid money and too many counterinsurgency and “quick fix” projects have even benefited the insurgents, such as taxes on road convoys, thereby contributing to the conflict, according to US officials.
Aid has not stabilized but has fuelled conflict in Afghanistan,” said Yama Torabi, co-director of Integrity Watch Afghanistan (IWA), a corruption watchdog.
Less aid more effective?
“Too much aid without proper monitoring is more vulnerable to misuse and corruption, but less aid through appropriate development channels will be more effective and transparent,” said Torabi.
Afghanistan’s civilian development bodies would increasingly take charge of aid spending, which would enhance aid effectiveness and accountability, he said.
However, the government is ranked one of the three most corrupt states in the world and worsening security means there are no strong guarantees for aid effectiveness after international military disengagement.
Some experts emphasize the quality of aid rather than the quantity. AREU’s Fallavier commented:
“Development aid cannot be measured by the amount of money poured in, but in terms of building a capacity in which Afghans can take care of themselves.”
Back to Top
Back to Top
U.S. pledges 36 mln dollars for Afghan agriculture sector
KABUL, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- In efforts to enhance and modernize agriculture sector in Afghanistan, the United States has pledged 36 million U.S. dollars to boost agriculture sector in the war- torn country, U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan Karl W. Eikenberry said Sunday.
"This is a 36 million U.S. dollars initiative that will modernize the Afghan Ministry for Agriculture, Irrigation and Livestock operations and help it even more effective in Kabul and all other provinces," ambassador Eikenberry told a one-day seminar attended by some 300 Afghan and U.S. agriculture officials and specialists.
The initiative, he added, has two objectives to help Afghan agriculture ministry develop capacity and managed funds received from the donors.
"The ministry for agriculture would provide services to Afghan farmers directly," he said. The second objective is to establish an office that will analyze ministry's functions and achievements.
Reaffirming the U.S. long-term commitments, Eikenberry said, " This project here today is another tangible sign, tangible commitment of Americans for Afghan government and Afghanistan's people."
"Our job today is to connect American know how to Afghan policies and change the life of Afghan farmers and their families, " said Afghan Agriculture Minister Mohammad Asif Rahimi at the seminar.
He said the seminar will discuss Afghanistan's agricultural priorities with the U.S. technical support. "We will succeed together if we each contribute and we each do our best," said Rahimi.
Back to Top
Back to Top
Afghan Radio Wars: Combating the Taliban's Message Machine
By Jason Motlagh / Forward Operating Base Andar Sunday, Nov. 28, 2010 time.com
At dusk last Friday, four Taliban mortars crashed to the ground near the district center in Miri, a small town in eastern Ghazni province where a U.S. Army company is based. Shrapnel from one of the blasts injured two children in a residential area, a 12-year-old girl and one-year-old boy, who later died of his injuries. It was the second time in as many months that militants had killed local civilians, and U.S. forces were not going to let it be forgotten.
Within two hours of the attack, a message was drafted by the battalion's "information operations" team to be broadcast by its new on-base radio station. In the cramped confines of a steel shipping container-turned-studio, Karimullah, the Afghan announcer, broke the news that both children were taken to an area hospital by American soldiers "for the best possible care, but the little boy was too badly hurt. The insurgents," he lamented, "continue to harm their fellow Afghans and kill your children needlessly."
Words are now weapons in the fight for Afghan hearts and minds — but they must be deployed faster than ever to be effective. In recent years, the Taliban-led insurgency has evolved a vast propaganda machine with a full range of tools to spread their message. The once anti-media movement now operates websites featuring updated battlefield reports; it also mass-produces DVDs with raw video of attacks against coalition forces. Meanwhile, the Taliban's regional spokesmen communicate with domestic and foreign press in real time via cell phone.
But no medium is as powerful as radio in this poor, largely illiterate country with limited access to TV and the internet. On both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan border, Taliban-sponsored FM stations drive home the insurgents' messaging campaign, with the threat of physical punishment or worse reserved for those who don't tune in. Mobile clandestine radio stations and portable transmitters enable militants to tap and commandeer local airwaves almost at will.
Recognizing the Taliban's head-start on this critical front, NATO military officials have ramped up the spin cycle in the Afghan backcountry. Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of U.S. and international forces in Afghanistan, recently issued operational guidelines stressing that the "information war" must be fought aggressively to ensure insurgent propaganda is not just promptly challenged but also beaten to the punch. "Turn our enemies' extremist ideologies, oppressive practices and indiscriminate violence against them. Hang their barbaric actions like millstones around their necks," the guidelines say. "Be first with the truth."
So when a battalion of the U.S. Army's 101st airborne division arrived in Ghazni province's hostile moonscape late this summer to build a base from scratch, they brought radio equipment and DJ Karimullah. Trained at a radio station in his native Khost province, the 25-year-old has worked on the U.S. payroll in three of the country's perennial hot spots: Khost, Paktika and now Ghazni, where Radio Andar 96.7 was launched in August. From a makeshift studio that has a mattress for a chair, he and his partner, Faruq, are on the air from 7 in the morning until 10 at night, seven days a week, broadcasting a mix of pro-government news briefs, Koranic recitations, Hindi pop songs and, when he's in the mood to spice things up, a bit of Michael Jackson. With a modest $500-a-month salary, he says it's the dynamic platform that sustains him. "In Afghanistan radio is a kind of power," he beams with wide-eyed enthusiasm. "Everybody knows me."
Each day at work, Karimullah wears a baseball cap and shiny brown pleather jacket over his customary shalwar kameez tunic. And while he relishes the small degree of fame, he insists that educating fellow Afghans to embrace their country is what drives him. Much of his time on-air deals with themes of basic civic awareness, such as "The Afghan Constitution" or "Who is President Karzai?" He also offers a kind of traffic update: practical advice on what places to avoid because of heavy fighting. Listeners, for the time being, can reach him with questions and concerns via text messages which he addresses on air. But he has plans for a call-in show that will focus on more culturally sensitive issues, such as women's rights. He'll have to be careful, too. His attention to women's concerns have already drawn several death threats, making it impossible for him to travel "outside the wire."
Even if he's a long way from winning over ultra-conservative Afghans, Karimullah has the full trust of American supervisors, who give him a lot of latitude on the job. "He knows what people want and just rolls with it," says Lieut. R. J. Peek, an information officer with the 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry. "He puts out the message in such a way that it doesn't sound American, but Afghan-to-Afghan, with the positive spin it should have." Although their operating budget is lean, U.S. forces in Ghazni have tapped into alternative funding streams to support the wider radio effort. Ever-popular hand-cranked radios are being distributed in larger numbers at the village-level to expand the audience.
The push has struck a chord. In some districts the Taliban has responded by collecting hundreds of radios and destroying them. Elsewhere, they've targeted radio towers. The Americans, in turn, have started jamming Taliban radio frequencies and going door-to-door with "reverse night information papers," their own version of the Taliban's notorious "night letters", turning an intimidation tactic on its head. The battalion commander, Lieut. Col. David Fivecoat, calls it a necessary measure to stay a step ahead of the militants, and the Afghan news cycle. "We are working hard to make sure the insurgents don't have the opportunity to blame us," he says. Indeed, as the fighting season winds down, the information war is still in overdrive.
Yet given the insurgency's long-standing chokehold over areas like Ghazni, old fears are proving difficult to shake. A day after the errant Taliban mortars claimed two innocent casualties, soldiers stationed in Miri went to assess the damage in a nearby neighborhood. According to Lieut. Philip Divinski, most people had already heard the Taliban was responsible from word-of-mouth or the radio. They could also assume as much, based on the previous militant mortar attack in October that killed two people and injured at least 10 more in the bazaar. Despite the deadly reprise, he was struck at how indifference exceeded anger among the victims' families and friends. "Sadly, it seems people have gotten used to this kind of thing," says the officer. "They understand who's at fault, but they're just too afraid to turn against them."
Back to Top
Back to Top
Cleanup operation kills 7 Taliban militants, wounds 3 in N Afghanistan
PUL-E-KHUMRI, Afghanistan, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- A cleanup operation launched against Taliban militants in Baghlan-e-Markazi district of northern Baghlan province have left seven insurgents dead and three others injured, police spokesman in the province Ahmad Jawed Basharat said Sunday.
"The operation backed by international troops and kicked off on Saturday afternoon has claimed the lives of seven Taliban rebels and wounded three others so far," Basharat told Xinhua.
Over 140,000-strong NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) stationed in Afghanistan to stabilize security, have been backing Afghan security forces in war against Taliban and associated militants.
The police spokesman also stressed that several villages had been cleared from Taliban insurgents since Saturday.
Baghlan-e-Markarzi district has been regarded as Taliban hotbed in Baghlan province since early this year.
"The cleanup operation would continue till the eviction of insurgents and restoring government control there," he further said.
Taliban militants fighting Afghan and NATO-led troops have yet to make comment.
Back to Top
Back to Top
Good Cop, Bad Cop: Afghanistan's National Police
Police Is Critical Part in Fighting Insurgency, But Many Problems Remain
CBS.com Nov. 28, 2010
President Obama wants to begin withdrawing American forces from Afghanistan next summer, but his ability to do that will largely depend on how quickly Afghan security forces can be trained to take over the fight.
While the Afghan army has made some strides in recent years, the national police force has developed a reputation for drug abuse, illiteracy and desertion.
Earlier this month The New York Times reported that up to 19 Afghan police officers from southwest of Kabul defected to the Taliban en masse, taking their guns with them and burning down their own station house.
On paper, the Afghan National Police (ANP) are supposed to be about 120,000 strong, but no one knows for sure the actual number of policemen on duty, nor how many of them are good cops and how many are bad.
What is certain is that the U.S. has spent nine years and more than $7 billion building and training the Afghan police force. "60 Minutes" wanted to find out what has become of that investment.
We began with the three-star American general now in charge of their training. "The police have to succeed," Lt. General William Caldwell told CNN's Anderson Cooper.
"If the Afghan police fail, we fail?" Cooper asked.
"We do," Caldwell replied.
Caldwell began overseeing training of the Afghan security forces last November. He's the highest ranking officer ever assigned to the mission, a sign of how important it is and how badly it has been going.
"The sooner we can develop an effective police force, the sooner U.S. forces will be able to have less of an active combat role," Caldwell explained.
"If we had a better-trained Afghan police at this point, that would save American lives?" Cooper asked.
"There's no question that'd be true," Caldwell replied.
When Caldwell took over, he found more than half of the Afghan police had not received any formal training whatsoever; most of them couldn't even read or write.
We visited the National Police Academy in Kabul, and were shown well-drilled officer candidates marching in unison. But a video, shot by an American instructor in 2008 at a basic training course in Southern Afghanistan, tells a different story: in the video, dozens of recruits were unable to do jumping jacks in sync. Some were unable or unwilling to do the exercises at all.
It shows that while Afghans may be known as fierce fighters, teaching them to become professional police officers or even do basic exercises is a massive challenge.
Not only are most of the police illiterate, but it turns out many of them also have a drug problem.
"There's one study said ten to twenty percent use or smoke hash and other forms of drugs," Cooper told Caldwell.
"And that's probably an accurate statistic too based on what we've seen," he replied.
Another video, taken by a member of the 82nd Airborne, shows an Afghan policeman smoking marijuana before going on patrol - evidently not an uncommon ritual.
"You must have known you were taking on a huge challenge when you got this assignment. Were you surprised, though, at what you found with the police?" Cooper asked.
"That's a great question. I felt very comfortable comin' in, workin' with the army piece. I knew the police portion would be a challenge," Caldwell replied, with a slight grin on his face.
"You're being diplomatic," Cooper pointed out.
"Yeah, I've got a great team that's workin' with me that's really helped me work through these challenges of the police," Caldwell replied.
One of Caldwell's biggest challenges is he still doesn't have enough manpower for the mission. Nine nations have sent 500 police trainers, but hundreds more are still needed.
At one training camp we visited, some Italian police officers were teaching the recruits marksmanship and crowd control. As of now, most Afghan police recruits only get six weeks of training.
In past years, many Afghan police received no follow-up training in the field. The goal today is for American and international forces to regularly supervise them.
National Guard troops from the Boston area with the 101st Field Artillery Regiment and are spending their year-long tour mentoring Afghan police north of Kabul.
"Pretty much if he opened up on us right now, he might not hit anybody," a U.S. sergeant joked, referring to an Afghan policeman standing nearby holding a large machine gun.
To keep the Afghans on target and turn them into a professionalized force that can win the support of the country's rural population, the Americans spend up to four days in a row living and working with them, keeping a constant lookout for corruption.
"The army's there to protect the nation; the police are there to protect the people," Caldwell explained.
When asked how important the police are to the counterinsurgency efforts of the U.S., the general said, "Perhaps one of the most critical pieces."
"Most critical?" Cooper asked. "More than the Afghan National Army?"
"Even more so than the army," Caldwell said. "And the reason why is because the police are the face of the Afghan government."
"The police are exactly what General Caldwell says they are. They are the face of the government. If the government is corrupt, the police are inevitably corrupt. And that is how the population sees them," Peter Galbraith told Cooper.
In 2009, Galbraith was the United Nations' number two man in Afghanistan.
"Part of your portfolio when you were with the U.N. in Afghanistan was the police," Cooper remarked. "Have you had interactions with the police?"
"Well, I had one particular incident with the police, actually, just near the American embassy. As I passed a roundabout, my bodyguard had to pay off the police in order for us to proceed," Galbraith remembered.
"So, wait. You got hit up by the Afghan National Police in Kabul?" Cooper asked. "For a bribe?"
"Hit up by the Afghan National Police, a stone's throw from the American Embassy, for a bribe," Galbraith replied.
Asked what that tells him that the Afghan National Police would hit him up for money, considering his important status, Galbraith said, "If they would do that for someone in my position, just imagine what it was for ordinary Afghans."
Galbraith was fired by the U.N. after protesting the fraud associated with Afghanistan's presidential elections. He says the police are the most corrupt institution in the country.
"Who are the police? They are illiterate villagers, many of them users of drugs who come in, they have a six-week training course. Now, how can you teach somebody to read and write, to be a policeman, to defend themselves in six weeks? It just isn't possible. So what emerges is not a policeman, but someone who is marginally more effective at extorting money from his fellow citizens," Galbraith said.
Asked if he believes the police are making the insurgency worse, Galbraith said, "Without a doubt."
They certainly made it worse in a place called Marjah. When U.S. Marines went on the offensive there last spring, they weren't just trying to root out the Taliban - they were also there to help replace corrupt Afghan police who had been harassing and extorting local residents.
"When somebody says there's corruption in the police force, my answer is, 'Okay, first of all, we haven't formally trained 'em, and then we didn't pay 'em right,'" Caldwell said. "In other words, the amount of money they were gettin' paid each month was insufficient for them to provide for themselves to live with a family in Afghanistan. So we in fact had set the conditions that made that policeman have to look for other ways to make money."
"I remember being in Kabul in 2002, going out with special forces and everyone then said, 'Look, this is a key element. This is crucial to helping Afghanistan stand up for itself.' Did people just forget about the police?" Cooper asked.
"There just hasn't been the focus on the police," Caldwell replied.
Before Caldwell arrived, much of the actual police training was overseen by civilian contractors working for the U.S. State Department. But according to a government audit, there was no "measurement of contractor performance," nor was any "specifictype of training . . . required."
Nevertheless, of the $7 billion the U.S. has spent training the police, over one billion went to pay the contractors.
"Has the money that's been spent training the Afghan police over the last eight years, has that been wasted?" Cooper asked.
"What I would tell you, it has not gotten us to where we need to be today," Caldwell said.
Since taking command, Caldwell has reorganized the entire training program. He has replaced nearly 400 private contractors, who he says lacked initiative and flexibility, and saved $150 million in the process.
There is now a plan to teach tens of thousands of Afghan police how to read at a basic level. Drug testing is mandatory, and to combat corruption, police wages have been doubled. To make sure Afghan officers actually get paid, American military teams monitor the police bureaucracy.
Police working in volatile areas are now paid $240 a month, about three times what most Afghans make, but not a lot of money for what may be the most dangerous job in country. Isolated at checkpoints and travelling in unarmored vehicles, the police are three times more likely to be killed in battle than Afghan army soldiers, and every month thousands just up and quit.
We found U.S. soldiers handing out leaflets, trying to recruit replacements. Caldwell wants to increase the police force by 15,000 over the next year, but to do that, 50,000 new recruits will have to be found and trained.
It'll then be up to American troops in the field to make sure they remain on the job and not on the take.
Former U.N. deputy envoy to Afghanistan Peter Galbraith believes even American forces' best efforts will have a limited effect.
"General Caldwell is now not just focused on training, but also on mentoring Afghan police in the field. Does that make a difference?" Cooper asked.
"For the time that there are U.S. troops with the police? Yes. Probably, when there are American troops there, the police are not openly extorting bribes at checkpoints. But the American troops are not there 24/7," Galbraith said.
"What kind of a task did General Caldwell have ahead of him in terms of trying to reform the police? Rebuild to create them?" Cooper asked.
"The police are incapable of being reformed," Galbraith replied. "It cannot be done."
"You mean it's just going to take a long time?" Cooper asked.
"Well, it cannot be done within a time horizon that you or I or the American people would find acceptable. We're talking about something that will take 100 years, generations," Galbraith predicted.
"Wait, you think it would take 100 years to really equip, train, create an Afghan national police force?" Cooper asked.
"Oh, you can equip them. You can provide some training. But you can't make them honest. You can't make them literate. You can't make them committed to the notions of policing that we have in the West," Galbraith said.
Caldwell told us building the police force will take several years, but says they are currently ahead of their recruiting goals and sees recent improved public opinion polls about police performance as proof they are marching in the right direction. Rating their progress will be a crucial part of a comprehensive White House review of the war in Afghanistan scheduled for next month.
"We have some enormous challenges still ahead of us. But I feel very optimistic about where we're going with the future now. And I feel like we've put it on the right path. We've got the resources. We've got the leadership of our country behind us. And we can make a change here," Caldwell predicted.
"But the clock is ticking," Cooper remarked.
"It is," Caldwell agreed.
Back to Top
Back to Top
Afghan Officials Should Register Assets: World Bank
TOLOnews.com Sunday, 28 November 2010 20:00
World Bank and other donors have warned to suspend their aid if all Afghan government officials do not register their assets
The High Office of Oversight and Anti-corruption (HOOAC) said on Sunday that the World Bank has urged the Afghan government to finish reviews over the registered assets of five ministers and twelve other high-ranking government officials.
The HOOAC said donor countries have put pressure on Afghanistan in this regard.
The HOOAC called on all government officials in particular MPs and Afghan ambassadors to register their assets.
"World Bank and other donors greatly emphasise on this issue and in case asset registration forms are not filled, they will suspend their aid," said head of the HOOAC, Mohammad Yasin Osmani.
According to the law, to fight against corruption the HOOAC is responsible to register entire assets of all government officials.
The HOOAC slammed Members of Parliament for being carless in terms of having their assets registered.
"Despite the fact that we sent register forms officially and did some paper work, only 11 MPs have filled in the forms," Mr Osmani said. The Afghan government sees asset registration of officials as one of the ways tackling corruption.
At a conference in the wake of this year, president Karzai ordered that the entire assets of top government officials be registered annually. President Karzai has said there will be no room for corrupt ones in the government.
Back to Top
Back to Top
Calls From Man With Terror Links Prompted German Alert, Official Says
New York Times By MICHAEL SLACKMAN November 28, 2010
BERLIN - Germany’s recent decision to declare a terrorism alert and dispatch heavily armed police around the nation was set off by phone calls from a man who said he wanted to quit working with terrorists and warned of a pending Mumbai-style attack, according to a law enforcement official with firsthand knowledge of the alert.
The man’s calls to the German Federal Criminal Police earlier this month prompted a quick turnaround by the interior minister, Thomas de Maizière, who had tried to preserve a public appearance of calm even while law enforcement and intelligence forces had stepped up behind-the-scenes efforts to safeguard the nation from the growing threat of radical Islamic terrorists.
“Whoever knows the personality of Minister for the Interior de Maizière knows that he is not a man of quick conclusions,” said Rolf Tophoven, director of the Institute for Terrorism Research and Security Policy in Essen.
But the caller, who claimed to have been a jihadist working with terrorists in the Pakistan-Afghanistan region, phoned the federal police three times providing what law enforcement officials said was concrete information: plans for a team of armed terrorists to rampage through the Reichstag, the popular tourist site that also serves as the home for Germany’s Parliament.
Even more alarming, the man said that there were already two members of the group in or near Berlin, and that four others would soon be trying to join them, according to the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of his work in intelligence and security matters.
The existence of the caller, who was not identified, was first reported in the German magazine Der Spiegel.
At the moment, the official said, security agencies were focused on four or five possible terrorist plots aimed at different locations around the country. The official said the authorities were uncertain if the plots were linked in one grand scheme or if they were completely separate.
In the nearly two weeks since the interior minister issued his warning, Germany appears have settled down from its early jitters, with streets and shops and markets busy in spite of a cold snap. Christmas lights have been hung along busy streets, and the familiar booths for Christmas markets have also gone up, selling crepes and warm mulled wine, candy, sausages and other treats.
Reports of suspicious packages appear to have slowed down. Commuters hurry past bomb-sniffing dogs and travelers ask heavily armed police officers for directions at the main train station in Berlin.
The lawn in front of the Reichstag, which has since been closed to tourists, is quiet. The familiar long line out front is gone. Heavy security surrounds the Chancellery, police officers patrol airports and hop into trains when they cross into Germany, and there is an intense effort to monitor the border.
Security forces are still on the lookout for two men, believed to be in the Berlin area and part of the plot on the Reichstag, and federal and intelligence forces have been watching German citizens known to have traveled to the Pakistan-Afghanistan region. Two German citizens believed to be connected with terrorist training camps are being held in a Turkish prison, awaiting return to Germany, officials said.
When Der Spiegel first reported the existence of the caller and the Reichstag as a target, police and security officials said that talk of a specific target was speculation. But the law enforcement official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the report was correct, though the official lamented the leak, saying it may have endangered the life of the informer and tipped off terrorists that German officials knew of their plans.
The law enforcement official also said the report may have prompted them to choose an alternate target. The official also warned that there was no way to know if the caller was providing accurate information or was sincere in his desire to switch sides, or whether the calls were part of a ruse to trick German law enforcement, like the Jordanian double agent who gained the trust of American officials in Afghanistan before bombing a base there, killing seven C.I.A. officials.
The man asked German officials to help him return to his family, presumably in Germany. If German forces are able to locate the caller and bring him in, the official said, they will initially treat him as potentially hostile.
Since the terrorism alert, German officials have tried to convince the public that regardless of the veracity of the caller’s information, Germany faces the threat of an attack from radical Islamists, not only from the Pakistan region, but from home as well. Increasingly, security officials have acknowledged their growing concern that German citizens are becoming radicalized and perhaps plotting strikes.
Shortly after the government raised its terrorism alert and closed the Reichstag to tourists, the chancellor, Angela Merkel, called for calm and then in her weekly video podcast, said this was a concern not just for German law enforcement, but for all of NATO: “terrorism, failed states — these are the future challenges against which we have to prepare ourselves.”
Stefan Pauly contributed reporting.
Back to Top
Disclaimer:
This news site is mostly a compilation of publicly accessible articles
on the Web in the form of a link or saved news item. The news articles
and commentaries/editorials are protected under international copyright
laws. All credit goes to the original respective source(s).